Jedi don’t run

[Geel Zlta]

“It’s time for you to go home.”
– Obi-Wan Kenobi

The Jedi Master looked back at the students watching him.

Sitting on the floor with his classmates, young Geel listened – but not intently. His mind wandered, as it often did when he tried to imagine being a Jedi.

He was lean and wiry. He was just one of many, not yet apprenticed. But one day, he’d be out there, traveling to exotic worlds with his Master. They’d provide peace and order for all of the citizens of the galaxy, defeating evil wherever they found it.

Then he saw himself as a Jedi Knight, fighting in the war. Sure, there was not one currently, but they came along often enough for Geel to play his part in at least one of them.

And then, finally, he imagined becoming a Jedi Master, yet still young – as one of the wise sages of the Order. Then he’d really do some great feats. He’d lead the valiant battle against the Sith. He’d rid the galaxy of Dark Jedi.

The dark-side would tremble before him!

 

[Geel Zlta]

The adolescent imagination knew no bounds. Nor did it appreciate boundaries – especially ones that did not fit in with what he felt was his destiny.

The Code was one such shackle. He agreed with all of its teaching in principle, but he was the Youngling that continued to question when others transferred their energies into faith.

It was one thing to combat the dark-side – surely it was a real challenge, given the battle was thousands of years old. But to do so with one hand tied behind your back? That was simply stupid in Geel’s mind.

If the Code could be seen as a set of guidelines, as opposed to rules, they stood a chance of defeating the Sith.

 

[Geel Zlta]

“Thinking again?”

Geel was roused from this thoughts by the Master’s voice. “Sorry,” he said.

“In my lessons, do your best to be in the here and now.” This comment brought a peel of laughter from the other Youngings.

“So,” the Master continued, “What is so important it occupies your mind when I’m teaching?”

Geel gazed at the floor, and then up at the Master. “What if I am faced with a decision where my heart and the Code are in conflict.”

“That should never happen. The Code is congruent with the Force, and the Force is attuned to your heart.”

“But what if? I won’t know what to do.”

“You will.”

“Maybe I won’t.”

“Then perhaps the answer will come to you in another form.”

 

[Geel Zlta]

Geel didn’t know what that meant. But he never forgot the conversation. Jedi Masters were known to speak in riddles, and, invariably, he forgot about them as soon as he stepped out of the classroom.

But not this time.

 

[Geel Zlta]

The Force was a mysterious energy field that sprang from life itself; that much, every Jedi student knew. The Force could be used for many purposes: protection, persuasion, wisdom – even the manipulation of matter and the performance of great physical feats. Jedi taught younglings all of those things.

But they never taught you how to make the Force go away when it wasn’t wanted. That was all Geel had asked from the Force for years. And the blasted thing kept ignoring him and showing up.

He’d been in motion since he’d walked away from the Order, many years earlier. Maybe he’d fled? Fearful that his awkward behaviour and philosophy would mean he would not become a Padawan and therefore he’d be assigned to something like the AgriCorps.

These had been the darkest of days. The days when life as he knew it had fallen apart. He still didn’t understand much of it. There he’d been, having relied for his entire life on the Order for everything: food, shelter, education, and security.

And then, all at once, he’d been on a routine mission with a Jedi Master. The Master fought to protect him – and he fought to protect her. She died. He fled. She died so he could escape, but to what end? What did she hope for him?

Why did the Code and the Force not save her? The believer.

The young Geel hadn’t known. He’d known only that, in the end, the Force hadn’t helped her.

 

[Geel Zlta]

It’s not your friend, he’d told himself. It was one reason he refused to use it, even if it made his life a little easier. He’d also refused to take up his borrowed lightsaber. He discarded it as soon as he could. What good were lightsabers? What good was the Force and the Code, if it allowed its most devoted followers to be cut down so easily?

“A Jedi uses the Force for guidance,” the lesson went. Yeah, guidance right into a black hole!

The problem was that the Force couldn’t be turned off like a switch. Many of the benefits it conveyed were subtle. They enhanced traits without his conscious effort. No act of will could make it stop; no lapse of belief could make it fully vanish.

And so he survived.

He’d resisted friendships and long-term romantic connections, and he’d mostly restrained his chivalrous impulses. The teenager had managed all those things.

But weeks turned to months, and months to years, and no ‘other form’ presented itself with a gift-wrapped solution.

Then he’d discovered drinking. It eliminated his worries entirely. Or rather, most of them...for most of the time.

 

[Geel Zlta]

He’d drunk to forget.

He’d drunk to remember.

He’d brawled to let off steam. He’d taken the dangerous jobs to fund his lifestyle – and then began it all again.

He wasn’t some chivalrous nomad, skulking from planet to planet doing good deeds and leaving when things got too hot. No, he left when things got dull. When the drinking money ran out, or when the bar-owner’s daughters wanted to get serious.

And he also left whenever he got too comfortable. That was when the Force, tired of being suppressed, would sneak back like an ignored pet. He didn’t want it complicating his world, making him feel like somebody’s property again. And he didn’t like being reminded about what had happened in that other life.

 

[Geel Zlta]

Then one day, he decided he was sick of playing. In truth, it was no moment of epiphany, and had grown over a period of months. He’d saved someone from a mugging. He’d thwarted a heist of medical supplies. And in between the good deeds had grown in stature and frequency.

And he knew. Maybe that old master was right? Or maybe he just saw what he wanted to see. He would be all that a Jedi could be. The title did not bother him – and the Code he would nod to, but not let it define him.

Good and evil – that was all that mattered. He was not evil – but in truth he was not wholly good. He was not the Jedi everyone hoped to meet, but he was the Jedi they needed. The sort that got his hands dirty when required.

All he needed was a cause to fight for – and more training.